Symeon Paschalidis

Károli Unniversity, Department of Humanities and the Hungarian Patristic Society

would like to invite you to a talk by

Symeon Paschalidis

(Professor of Patristics and Hagiography at the Theology Faculty of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki; Director of the Patriarchal Institute for Patristic Studies)

Modes of Communication between East and West

through the Veneration of Common Saints

Three elements contribute favourably to the ecclesiastical relations between Rome and Constantinople until after the Schism in the late Middle Ages: first, the preservation of Greek in the West; second, Latin and Greek translations, from one language to the other, favoured in part by the emigration towards the West of Byzantine scholars and the travels of pilgrims to Rome, Thessaloniki and Constantinople; third, in a decisive manner, the translation of the saints calendar. The discovery and edition of hagiographical texts still today enrich the knowledge of this common patrimony. We can then observe how the common cult of martyrs and saints constitutes a place of communion, despite divisions and the changing historical circumstances. The circulation of relics, with all its political ambiguity, also constitutes a manifest sign of this communion during the Middle Ages.